Its good to see Evgeny Morozov blogging over at FP - we've always liked his work, as there should be more written about the impact of the blogosphere on politics in authoritarian states.  Earlier this week he had a great post up about the Kremlin's attempts to tap into Russia's growing class of young and creative internet users to help "make [the] Kremlin's increasingly unappealing ideological package relevant to the younger generations."  No, the Nashi-inventor Vladislav Surkov was not behind this brilliant 21st century propaganda idea, but rather Gleb Pavlovsky.  Among many other strange government funded projects online, Morozov discovers a "school of bloggers" which teaches young supporters how to achieve the state's goals online, and a series of lectures and user-submitted YouTube videos.  I include the mentioned video after the jump, which is sumptiously soundtracked with ...

Is your 2008 going out with a bang, or slouching toward the exits? Here's a chart for those who like a golden end to the year ...brA href=http://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?s=$GOLDp=Damp;st=2008-01-01amp;id=p71883825505amp;listNum=10amp;a=157883026img style=WIDTH: 480px alt= src=http://local.content.compendiumblog.com/uploads/user/7e88b461-578b-47f3-88ec-038e212ad053/aa0ff38d-9bb9-44a5-bba5-8be30d8f6977/commodityandbonds.png _width=75 _height=75/AbrThis compares gold (green line) to silver (blue line), the Samp;P 500 (black line), oil (red line) and the TLT bond fund (pink line). Obviously, bonds got the better of 2008. But what will happen in 2009? That's the real question.brbrHere, in my latest web-cast, I try to answer some of those questions in A href=http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/MAM-TV/mam-tv.htmlstrongmy latest broadcast for MaM-TV/strong/A. Those are my answers. What are your answers? There are plenty of answers around, but the trick is asking the right questions.brbrHere are some other things to think about.brbrFirst of all, the A href=http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSTRE4BT55Y20081231strongFed is going to buy $500 million in mortgage-backed securities /strong/Aby the middle of 2009. Will that finally unstick the frozen mortgage markets?brbrMoney is ...

The Globe and Mail asks an interesting question: Mr. Medvedev is known to be a great lover of rock 'n' roll, especially as practised by Deep Purple and Pink Floyd. Lately, one could be forgiven for wondering if the Beatles have taken over his iPod. Back to the USSR, perhaps? Actually the full editorial is well worth reading, exploring the question of whether extended powers, term limits, and legislative pliancy actually help any given leader implement reforms, or whether it's just a cheap rhetorical cover for a power grab. This isn't Michael Bloomberg we're talking about here.